


Fast Enough

by Ginover



Category: X-Men (Movieverse), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, I suck at titles, Other, Reader-Insert, and i suck at endings... sorry guys, i'm having way too many feelings about this silver-haired idiot... somebody send help, slight angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-14
Updated: 2016-08-14
Packaged: 2018-08-08 19:42:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7770523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ginover/pseuds/Ginover
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post X-Men Apocalypse. The reader got hurt and Quicksilver is a mother hen. Is it out of guilt or something else?</p><p>Based on <a href="http://thefandomimagine.tumblr.com/post/146745038670/submitted-by-anonymous-im-never-fast-enough">this tumblr post</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fast Enough

„I’m never fast enough when it matters…“

„What?“

You blinked sleepily and willed your eyes to focus. You had been almost asleep when Peter’s soft voice woke you up again.

“Nothing, just go back to sleep, Y/N”, was Peter’s answer.

You yawned and rubbed your forehead before trying to sit up. Peter’s hands on your shoulders quickly stopped you.

“No, don’t sit up. Don’t move! You have to stay still so your bones will heal quicker!”

“Hey, I’m not mortally wounded, I just have a broken leg.”

“And a broken hand. And a lot of internal bruising according to the doctors. They said you should stay in bed for at least two weeks.”

“I am in bed! And they didn’t say that sitting up was forbidden.”

“You’re a terrible patient, you know that, right?” Peter smirked before adjusting the pillow behind your back.

You grinned back at him: “Well, since I got hurt while saving your little ass, the least you can do now is keep me company while I’m confined to this hospital bed.”

You’d meant it as a joke, but Peter’s smirk disappeared as quickly as that last slice of pizza during your last movie night with him. A pang of guilt shot through you.

“Hey, that was a joke. Now you have to give me some witty retort.”

You nudged his side with your elbow. Peter didn’t look up when he adjusted the bed sheet on the side of your bed and mumbled: “I told you you shouldn’t have come to Cairo with us. Your mutant powers aren’t strong enough yet and you never had to fight anyone and…”  


“I’ve had my powers longer than you, Peter,” you said softly.  


He looked up at you.  


“A couple of months perhaps, but still… And besides, it was my own decision to come and join the fight. There was too much at stake.”  


“Yeah, like your life.”  


“Or yours!”  


You had never raised your voice against Peter before, but this argument was making you angry. He was treating you like a child, even though he knew that you had held your own in Egypt. You had fought alongside him, Jean, Kurt and the others, until Apocalypse had decided to let debris rain from the sky. One of the smaller pieces had hit you in the head and knocked you unconscious, so your body was unprotected when the bigger pieces fell down and fractured the left side of your body. You woke up in a hospital in the USA two days later with your left leg and your left hand in casts and purple-blueish bruises all over your body. Kurt was sitting beside your bed and grinning from one ear to another, when he saw that you had woken up.  


“Na endlich!!“  


„What?!“ you replied, still half asleep and high on pain meds.  


“I said ‘finally’… Peter’s not here for once, because I told him to get a shower, but he’s going to be very happy to see you awake. Like me.”  


And then Kurt told you what you had missed while you were unconscious and buried under a pile of rocks. Apparently, Peter had gone into berserk mode after seeing you get hurt. And he had decided to beat the living hell out of Apocalypse, before getting his own limbs broken by said mutant. The only reason why Peter wasn’t in a hospital bed beside you was that apparently his mutant powers included accelerated healing and his leg was nearly as good as new again. Then Kurt explained how Peter had spent most of the last two days beside your bed.  


“I think he feels guilty.”  


“Guilty for what?”  


“For not being able to protect you?! Keine Ahnung. You should ask him.”  


You had sighed. Then Peter had come back into the room and nearly toppled over his own two feet when he saw you awake. That was Wednesday. Now it was Friday. And still Peter spent most of his time in your room, keeping you company and lecturing the nurses about what sort of food should be hospital food (pizza and pasta of course) and how your pillows should be stacked behind your back. You liked him, but this was getting out of hand. Maybe that was one of the reasons why your current argument was about to escalate.  


“Peter, I think you should go and get some sleep. We can talk tomorrow.” You tried a smile.  


“You’re kicking me out…” he stated all matter-of-factly.  


“No, I’m just saying goodnight”, you replied softly.  


And then after a short pause, you added: “I’m not mad at you, Peter, I’m just tired.”  


“I told you to go back to sleep earlier.”  


He pulled a face.  


“Yeah, I know, I know…”  


You raised your hands in a defensive manner.  


“Oh by the way, you also said something else earlier. What was it?”  


Peter adjusted the sheets one last time and was about to leave the room, when he turned around again and stared at you: “Huh?”  


“Before I woke up... or before I feel asleep... you mumbled something. What was it?”  


“Oh that. Nothing.”  


You sighed. Not wanting to cause another argument, you decided to leave it at that. If he didn’t want to say it out loud – whatever it had been – there was nothing you could do.  


Peter turned around to leave the room, but stopped all of a sudden. He turned around to face you again and put his head to the side. Then he simply said: “I’m sorry I wasn’t able to protect you.”  


Silence.  


You opened your mouth to answer but before you could say a word, he had burst out with a hurried ‘gotta go, bye’ and run away, leaving behind a door that was falling shut with a soft click. And one confused mutant.  


  


***  


  


The next morning, you decided to throw caution to the wind and got up and got dressed. It took you 20 minutes to put on a new pair of underwear, sweatpants and a shirt and judging from the exasperated grunt the nurse made when he came into your room to serve you breakfast, your face and hair were a mess after your fight with the clothes and the casts. Either that or he didn’t like the shirt you were wearing. It was one of Peter’s band shirts.  


You quickly brushed your teeth, opted for some tinted chapstick, and pulled a comb through your unruly hair. Then, ignoring all objections from the nurse, you grabbed your crutch and hobbled out of your room and down the corridor to the phone booth. Once you were there, you realized the flaw in your plan. You had no idea what phone number to call. You knew there was a phone in Professor Xavier’s office. And there had to be other phones in the mansion as well. But you had never called any of them from the outside.  


“Y/N?!”  


You heard your name and turned around. Peter was standing behind you.  


“What the hell?”  


His eyes glanced down at his shirt on your body. Then he realized that he was staring at you longer than appropriate given the circumstances. And he stared at your face instead, exclaiming a confused “What on earth are you doing? Why aren’t you in your room?”  


“Peter…”  


You stepped forward. Your mind was racing because you were searching for the right words. You wanted to explain to him that you had wanted to call him. That you had wanted to talk to him about his last remark last night. And that you had wanted to make him understand that he didn’t have to be sorry about anything. You also wanted to step closer. What you most certainly didn’t want was for your crutch to get tangled in the phone cord and for you to fall over because you lost balance.  


Luckily Peter caught you.  


“Thanks.”  


Peter grinned and replied “I’m glad to be of service.” Then he helped you up.  


“For real though, what are you doing out here?”  


“I was gonna make a call.”  


“Who were you gonna call?”  


“You…?!”  


“Huh?”  


It was then that you realized there was an old woman in a bathrobe sitting in a wheelchair only 10-12 feet away from you. She seemed to be very interested in your conversation with the silver-haired boy in front of you.  


“Let’s go back to my room…”  


  


***  


  


Once you were back in your room, Peter helped you back onto your hospital bed. You could see how nervous he was. He wasn’t looking at your face and once you had settled on the bed, he started fiddling about with his fingers.  


“Peter, you’re making me nervous… sit down already”, you scolded him softly.  


“Nah, it’s okay. This won’t take long. I just came by to explain how I meant what I said last night.”  


“Yeah about that, I—“  


You were interrupted by his finger on your lips. He stared at you intently, a pleading look in his eyes.  


“Please…”  


You nodded and he took his finger away. You could still feel the warmth of his finger on your lips. You resisted the urge to lick them.  


“I…” he started. He cleared his throat and started over: “I’m so sorry. I feel like I’ve let you down, because I wasn’t able to protect you. I should have paid more attention. But I… I just wasn’t fast enough. I’m never fast enough when it matters!”  


He interrupted himself to scratch his forehead. While rambling on, he had started to tap his foot nervously. The rhythm was so fast that it almost sounded like a cat’s purr.

Then he continued: “I mean, damn, you could have gotten killed. You were buried under like 10 feet of rubble. We all thought you were dead! And I couldn’t even help them get you out because of my arm and leg… I felt so useless. So fucking useless!”  


“Hey…” you tried to stop him, but he didn’t listen.  


“I tried to help them, but they wouldn’t let me. Hank pushed me away. And the Professor did his mind thing where he told me to step aside and let the others dig you out. I thought you were dead until they pulled you out 10 minutes later. I…”  


And he broke down completely.  


“Fuck.”  


He buried his head in his hands and went silent.  


You had heard enough. You got up from the bed and hugged him. That’s when you could hear an audible gasp from him. He let his arms sink and – after a few seconds – he hugged you back.  


Still embracing him, you whispered softly: “You aren’t gonna get rid of me that easily, Peter. Don’t worry.”  


When there was no reply, you added: “Unless you _want_ to get rid of me.”  


His answer was barely audible: “Never.”  


In that moment, you could have sworn that he hugged you even tighter. But only 2 or 3 seconds later, he already let go of you.  


Before disappointment could settle in, you noted the look on his face. It was the same look he had, when he was about to pull a prank on someone. No, not just someone. More precisely, it was the look he had when he was about to pull a prank on the Professor or one of the teachers. Somewhere between amusement, fascination … and fear?  


Then – without a warning – he leaned forward and pressed his lips to yours.  


And time froze.  


  


***  


  


When you finally parted, you kept your eyes closed for just a moment longer than Peter. You wanted to cherish this moment that you had just shared. Then you opened your eyes and the first thing you saw was Peter’s grin. You couldn’t help but smile back at him.  


“See, you can also be fast enough when it matters...”  


“Huh?”  


“I’m talking about the kiss…”  


“Oh yeah, and you obviously didn’t mind the timing either.”  


“No, not at all.”  


You both sat there and grinned in perfect awkward synchronicity. After a few seconds, you wanted to say something to make things less weird, but you were interrupted by a knock on the door. Peter jumped off your bed, before the door opened. Professor Xavier came in.  


“Y/N, I’ve talked to your doctor. She agreed to release you if you continue your recovery at home. I promised her that I’d keep an eye on you and that I’d make sure you weren’t going to have any relapses… due to unnecessary _strain_ …” With his last words he looked at Peter.  


Peter’s eyes widened: “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Prof. I just came by to visit, you know, to keep her some company, and to make sure her recovery was going alright—“  


“And then you decided to test her pink lip balm, I see….” 

The Professor grinned at both of you.  


Peter quickly wiped off his lips, but it was too late.  


This didn’t seem to bother Xavier, though: “Listen,” he continued, “I don’t mind… _this_ at all. I’m just gutted that it took you so long. I’ve lost the bet because of you.”

With that he turned his wheelchair around and left the room to go and find the nurse to help you packing.  


Peter stared after him for a while… speechless. This was a first.  


Then he cleared his throat and looked at you: “The bet? They’ve had a bet… about us?!”  


“Seems like it.” You shrugged. “Wanna know what bothers me about this?”  


“You mean apart from the obvious breach of trust and what-not?” Peter replied sarcastically.  


“Yeah, apart from that…” You grinned at him. “Seems like once again you weren’t fast enough.”  


“Ooohhh how dare you?!!” Peter exclaimed in mock distress and grabbed a pillow and hit your good arm with it. “No pizza for you during your recovery!”  


“Oh just shut up and kiss me again before the Professor comes back!”  


You smiled and pulled Peter closer. Luckily, you didn’t have to ask him twice.

  


***


End file.
